When Junior Seau committed suicide last year, amid the reactions of shock and despair, there were many cautioning for patience before jumping to conclusions. Even if Seau’s pattern of behavior prior to his suicide suggested that he was suffering from the long-term effects from a lifetime of playing football, we didn’t know for sure.

Now we know for sure and we know the suspicions of many are confirmed. Not that it wasn’t right to withhold judgment until now.

Three independent neuropathologists from outside the NIH were given unidentified tissue from three different brains; one belonged to Seau, another to a person who had suffered from Alzheimer’s Disease, and a third from a person with no history of traumatic brain injury or neurodegenerative disease.

Dr. Lonser said the three experts independently arrived at the same conclusion as two other government researchers: that Seau’s brain showed definitive signs of CTE. Those signs included the presence of an abnormal protein called “tau” that forms neurofibrillary tangles, effectively strangling brain cells.

A statement released by the NIH said the tangles were found “within multiple regions of Mr. Seau’s brain.” In addition, the statement said, a small region of the left frontal lobe showed “evidence of scarring that is consistent with a small, old traumatic brain injury.”

The finding itself won’t have clear ramifications on the future of the sport and the lawsuit brought by former players against the league, but is the most high-profile case yet of a deceased player whose CTE was sustained as a result of playing football. That’s a problem for a lot of people.

A world-renowned orthopedic surgeon could not get the season’s biggest phenom (arguable, if you like) off of the field when it was obvious that RGIII’s knee was being held together by nothing more than that brace. The idea that the NFL actually cares about something as sissy as a brain is laughable.

Gotta agree with the Reindeer on this one, though I wouldn’t blame the “NFL” as if it were a single organism. This problem comes from so many directions. Coaches expect their guys to play through injuries, owners pay these guys a lot and if they miss too much time they’ll just find a replacement and fans love the idea that these guys are “warriors”. The NFL isn’t this shadowy, all-knowing beast. It’s a collection of men who are trying to maximize every player and when they’re no longer useful to simply dump them. Players know that and go out there hurt because if not they might not be able to make a living. Sure, superstars who make $4,000,000 a year have less to worry about, but the average guy whose career is three years and makes $500,000 needs to do what he can to extend that career, even if it’s only by one more season.

Players and their agents need to focus less on getting big contracts and more on getting BETTER contracts. They need to hamstring organizations in just the right way so that teams can’t just cut a guy because he missed five games with a concussion. This isn’t a normal job. I’m 30 and can do my job for another 30 years. If I lose this job I can find another one tomorrow in my field. The NFL isn’t like that. These guys have a limited window of time and an even more limited market. I personally would rather not see some of my favorite players killing themselves or crippled 10 years from now just for my amusement.

The new “no playing if you have a suspected concussion unless you can pass the field-sobriety-test-type-thing” rule is a good start. It needs to be expanded to all players in preseason screening and post-game though.

They’re going to have to start making baseline tests mandatory for every player who played after every game. The they’ll have to build some structure around minor vs major concussions and how many a player can sustain before ending their career.

It sounds like incredible overkill but I don’t see another way around it, you can’t trust the players to pull themselves out, and you can’t trust the coaches, owners, and the Ginger Hammer to do what is right.

Would that really do anything, though? I don’t know if the tests are that precise for guys that don’t actually get concussions. (I don’t think it’s specifically concussions that lead to this shit; the sub-concussive damage that comes from repeatedly bashing your head into other people is just as dangerous.)

I think there was a Purdue study that showed how much lower players scores post-season vs pre-season on a number of tests, so I think it’s just kinda…gonna happen. Which is all kinds of depressing.

Someone help me connect the dots. I know the usual policy is to just shit on Goodell but wasn’t the majority of Seau’s career played under Tags reign? Why is he the bad guy here? … and to be clear I think he’s the bad guy in a lot of other areas but I’m not sure about this one.

Not defending Goodell at all, and at the risk of sounding like a PFT commenter, what is he supposed to be doing? Seems like the league has taken measured steps to reduce the types of plays that cause head trauma and protect players from helmet to helmet hits.

If he goes further, everyone will scream ‘this isn’t flag football’ (if they’re not already). Just curious what the kommentariate thinks is the answer here, and what as commissioner Goodell should be doing differently regarding concussions / head trauma.

Seriously, I have no idea. It all boils down to when is too much too much? Sure, a big hit causing a concussion is obvious, like Harrison on McCoy, but it’s the repetitive head-banging of lineman and defensive players that is also a major issue and is less apparent. How do you monitor that? Doctors say one concussion is too many, so if you are conservative, it SHOULD be flag football. But, like you said, no one wants that.

Would you trade the joy you get as an NFL fan for Earl Campbell to walk again or to bring back Seau? Would the NFL trade its billions of dollars to save a few lives down the road? Nope. And these guys are dying early with dementia and CTS and other issues, and all they are getting is lip service.

BUT, o one is forcing them to play, either. They also choose to play the game and can retire early if they really want to avoid some of these issues. So should they protect themselves, or should someone protect them from themselves, and if so, how much? Fuck if I know. It makes me happy sometimes that I sucked at football so I never had to deal with these issues.

Also, how much of this damage is done in Pop Warner football? Developing brains are much more suseptable to long-term damage from events that wouldn’t do as much damage to fully developed brains. I’d love to see the number of players who show significant brain damage and how many of them played youth football as ratio compared to players without siginificant brain damage and who played Pop Warner.

One things for sure, I’m very glad my son didn’t play football. Say what you want, but a fully functioning brain is a hell of lot more valuable than $10 trophy for 10 year old football.

I’m not so sure that younger brains are more susceptible to long-term damage. I don’t know the answer, but I think that a developing brain is more likely to rebound from injury. I do agree that playing football at a young age probably contributes to the CTE problem later in life, though.

I know that the brain is still growing. That just leads me to believe that there is more potential to replace or compensate for damaged tissue. Compare that with a mature brain which is “set in stone,” so to speak.

My favorite thing is the NFL fining Jake Plummer for wearing the Tillman sticker too long but not mandating that players use modern, more protective helmets and allowing them to keep using the ones from the 80s that have less padding than a $15 bike helmet from Target.

1. Do its best to make sure that every player is fully aware of the risks of playing professional football. No more hiding/lying about/denying the existing data.

2. Empower physicians to have the final say about whether a player may return to the field, and immunize them from liability.

3. Partner with Riddell, Nike and other manufacturers to develop the safest protective gear that current technology can create, and then require players to wear it (enough with the sock fines, already).

4. Use its considerable P.R. machine to discourage children under the age of 14 from playing contact football (flag is fine).

The Ginger Hammer plans on putting the following warning label in every player’s locker: SURGEON GENERAL’S WARNING: Playing in the NFL causes brain damage, paralysis, suicide, and the urge to bitch slap your girlfriend. Problem solved, off to climb Mt Everest.

More ammo for Goodell, but I find it hard to fault him for trying to increase player safety no matter his motive. Football helmets have evolved from being just leather without face masks so it’s not like player safety concern is a new thing. Once protective equipment is enhanced to the point where injury reduction is marginal, then of course changing the way players play is next.

Well, at least this is progress from the good ol’ days of the 90’s, when the NFL’s response to this issue was to have Dr. Ira Casson toss any evidence of hits causing permanent brain damage into a fireplace while laughing maniacally.